How the government can develop jobs
TEXT OF STORY
Kai Ryssdal: Every Thursday, the Labor Department releases a statistic that measures first time claims for unemployment benefits. We don’t usually spend a lot of time with it ’cause a weekly number on something big like the U.S. economy is a tricky thing. But the president took advantage of a slight drop in first time claims last week to work his way into the news today. He’s going to host a job summit at the White House next month. We asked Marketplace’ Steve Henn what that might entail.
STEVE HENN: If you ask experts and entrepreneurs what will create new jobs, they’ll tell you credit and innovation.
Scott Shane studies entrepreneurship at Case Western Reserve University. He says if the administration wants to jump start job creation it needs to pay special attention to small businesses.
SCOTT SHANE: Being short on capital, it’s very hard for them to expand and hire additional people.
Many entrepreneurs rely on credit cards and home equity to get started. But those lines of credit have dried up. So Shane would like the administration to replace that cash. But money alone might not do it.
John Stchur is CFO of a biotech firm in Detroit called Asterand. He says venture capitalists helped him hire more than a 100 people in the past seven years. If the government’s serious, he says, it should create its own venture firms to focus on priorities like green technology.
JOHN STCHUR: That would be brilliant. Particularly those that are focused on the technology of the future.
Mary Sastry founded Sakti-3, a firm trying to develop the next generation of green batteries in Ann Arbor, Mich. All she wants is a level playing field for the green economy.
MARY SASTRY: That means that the people who produce petroleum and profit from petroleum are also paying the costs of that.
But she says other countries are jumping ahead in green tech.
SASTRY: Not only are companies competing in the marketplace, but countries are competing.
Sastry says new jobs will ultimately go to countries that constantly innovate. But right now she’s worried the U.S. has already lost its edge, at least in clean tech.
In Washington, I’m Steve Henn for Marketplace.
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